


Two of Hearts

by reginahalliwell



Category: Heartless - Marissa Meyer
Genre: Alternate Ending, F/M, Fix-It, Mirror Universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-21
Updated: 2017-04-21
Packaged: 2018-10-22 02:19:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,651
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10687764
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/reginahalliwell/pseuds/reginahalliwell
Summary: Two kingdoms, Hearts and Chess.Two paths, both to wife.Monarch, mistress, butcher, baker.One choice to save a life.Alternate, still-dark-but-not-quite-so-dark ending to Marissa Meyer's Queen of Hearts origin story Heartless.





	Two of Hearts

**Author's Note:**

> Poetry is mine--you can tell from the (lack of) quality.

Tillie the Owl cocked her head, her wide-eyed mask ominous as she asked, “Are you sure you wish to go?” 

“You should stay and play and live to see another day,” added the Fox with a devious smile. 

The Raccoon shivered, the eyes beneath her patterned mask blinking quickly. “Be merry and married, and monarch no more.”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Cath asked more harshly than she meant. The three girls had seemed so innocent but now frightened her, as much with their masks as with their words. 

“Nothing,” said Tillie, just as Elsie said, “Anything,” and Lacie “Everything.”

“Nothing, anything, and everything,” Cath repeated. “How curious. I do wish you would simply say what you mean.”

“We always mean what we say,” the Fox countered.

“Well I mean to go unless you have reason for me to stay,” Cath argued, her hand in Jest’s. 

The joker squeezed it tightly, as aware as she of the ill tidings the girls had foretold. Murderer. Martyr. Monarch. Mad.

It wasn’t that Cath didn’t believe the three of them—she had seen the treacle well for herself and knew of the Looking Glass’s existence. Her experience lately with the Jabberwock had reminded her that as safe as Hearts usually seemed, it could also be deathly dangerous. But they knew not to go through a door, and she would simply follow the trio’s instructions.

How did one leave without going through a door?

“Time presses on, so you must too,” Lacie said. 

“You can’t escape it,” Elsie added.

“I’m just trying to escape my betrothal to the king,” Cath protested. “Not time!”

“You were enjoying yourself all too much,” Tillie said. “Time took notice and sped the clock. It flies, you know, and all the faster when least you desire it.”

“Stop filling her head with all this nonsense,” said a voice. Cath turned and saw that the Cheshire Cat was there, lounging upside down on a tree branch just behind them.

“Cheshire!” Cath greeted, unsure why—or how—her companion had followed them here.

Sort of answering her unasked question, Cheshire enigmatically said, “You really must start keeping better company, Cath.”

Tillie, Lacie, and Elsie’s eyes held Cheshire’s for a few moments, before Tillie blinked and nodded in deference, turning to Cath and speaking in solemn verse.

“Two paths lie before you here,  
The road in twain, and much to fear.  
One makes you a mad monarch for life,  
The other a simple joker’s wife.  
You choose to stay or else to go,  
But both futures only we know.  
Monarch, mistress, butcher, baker.  
You made a friend but cannot take her.  
We seek a life in payment for yours,  
Choose it now—pick his or hers.  
One heart you break, one future forsake.  
The choice, once made, you cannot remake.”

Cath stared, wide-eyed, at Tillie. She knew who the friend was that Tillie spoke of—it must be Mary Ann. If she could even call her a friend anymore. 

“Are you saying that I can only be Jest’s wife if Mary Ann dies? And that Jest will die if I choose to stay? What does Mary Ann have to do with all this, anyway?” Cath was terrified, but also frustrated. Why couldn’t the girls say this plainly, so she could better know what to do? It was all terribly confusing. 

“Whatever you choose, one of them will die,” Elsie confirmed. 

“Fate, like Time,” Lacie added, “Is inescapable. It catches us all eventually.”

“Come now, choose,” Tillie spoke. “Time is of the essence.”

“No!” Cath responded more forcefully than she had ever spoken in polite company. “I will not choose to sacrifice either one. I love Jest with all my heart, and Mary Ann has been my dearest friend as long as I can remember. If there is a choice to be made that kills one of them, I will simply not make it.”

“You choose to not choose?” Tillie asked her.

“You dissent?” asked Elsie.

“You equivocate?” asked Lacie.

“I do. If anything terrible must happen, then it must happen to me. I won’t let Jest or Mary Ann be harmed.”

“Very well,” Tillie said. “You have chosen.”

“We are agreed.”

“A heart is forfeit.”

“But whose?” Cath asked. “I’m not a queen, I can’t fix your silly kingdom.” She spoke to Jest, though she realized it sounded harsh.

“Yours and not yours.”

“We will save your precious friend.” 

“And your requited love.”

“We will take from you but also give.”

“A choice to not choose, a queen to make and unmake.”

“A crown and a kiss and a kingdom to save.”

“A heart split in twain, part here to remain.”

The trio spoke so quickly that Cath could scarcely discern which voice belonged to each girl, let alone understand what they meant.

“Here,” said Cheshire, gesturing towards a looking glass that had appeared in the wall the three girls had been sitting on. She had forgotten that he was still there, briefly. 

She looked, and there in the mirror was her reflection, still holding the hand of her jester love. 

Cath’s glance turned towards the cat in inquiry. 

“They have given you a boon, at my request. The looking glass is fixed with magic, that you may walk through it without fully leaving. Time is of the essence, and yours is split in two. You will go through the mirror with Jest and live out your happy life, but another of you will remain here. Half your heart, too. You must be the Queen of Hearts, Cath, but that is not all you can be.”

“I don’t understand,” Cath protested. 

“This will save you some pain,” he said enigmatically. “Go through, Cath. Be the best baker in Chess.”

“And what of you, Cheshire?”

“I will stay here, and bother the Queen of Hearts. Cats are particularly skilled at being bothersome.”

“But will I…know I am in both places?”

“Go through the mirror, Cath. It is the best future any of us could hope for you. Time flies, now, and this time will never be again. Go now, or lose the chance.”

Cath sighed in confusion and desperation. She wanted to be with Jest, and be a baker, and she didn’t think those things necessitated crossing dimensions and stealing hearts, but then nothing seemed to make sense here. 

She squeezed Jest’s hand and looked at the reflection of the two of them in the mirror. He smiled and stepped through first, still holding her hand. She followed, and then turned to look back through the glass. Another Cath stood where she had just been, her hand against the mirror as though Jest had failed to pull her through. She tilted her head and saw her reflection do the same. 

Cath’s brow furrowed in puzzlement. She could clearly see herself on the other side of the mirror, but so too could she see Hatta and Cheshire, Tillie, Elsie, and Lacie, none of whom were on the Chess side of the glass. 

She let go of Jest’s hand, moving back towards the glass. “Is there really another me still in Hearts?”

Cheshire popped through the glass gracefully, straining his spine under her hand to beg for a pet. “Indeed. You can’t feel her anymore, though, can you?”

“No,” Cath said cautiously. “I know she’s me, but I don’t feel any different. And the moment I look away from the mirror,” she demonstrated, “I don’t really think about it anymore.”

“Good. You agreed to sacrifice yourself, and so your heart is forfeit. Or rather, her heart is forfeit. That would hardly be pleasant for you to experience. And certainly not worth this rumpus.”

“So, she’s going to die?” Cath asked, not happy with this outcome either.

“No, no. She’ll…ah, actually, don’t concern yourself with that, Cath. She’s not you. She’s just the Queen of Hearts. You’re Catherine Pinkerton, betrothed to a Rook of Chess. You can start fresh. Maybe one day word of your impressive creations will travel to Hearts, and I’ll pop over for a snack. Until then,” he finished and disappeared (she assumed through the looking glass) just as abruptly as he had appeared. The looking glass vanished, and Cath turned to Jest and smiled a bit sadly.

“Come, my love, I want to show you my home.”

“Oh, Jest. Do you think we could really be happy here, knowing all the misfortune we left in Hearts?”

“I could, Catherine. Could you?”

“You have captured my heart and soul, good Rook. I expect I will be happy anywhere I am with you.” 

“Then we ought to begin. It is a long way across the board…” He murmured, their hands together as they began to cross the kingdom’s expanse, a rook and a pawn in perfect tandem.

~

Cath looked at herself in the mirror in puzzlement, seeing her reflection walk away even as she stood still in front of it. “What in Hearts is going on here?” she asked, seeing herself venture into Chess with the Joker. “Cheshire? Hatta?”

“Come, your majesty,” said the Cat. “The king awaits you at the palace. He came calling for you and Mary Ann promised him some pear tarts in your absence. I’m sure they’ll make a suitable engagement gift, don’t you think?”

“Pear tarts, you say?” Cath murmured. “With some cheese and honey. Yes, that sounds lovely. I’ll have to prepare them as soon as I get home. Mother will want me to visit the king early tomorrow, I’m sure. With Mary Ann’s help I think we might finish them sooner.”

She paused, thinking something felt suddenly very strange. She felt wrong, somehow. She looked at the wall that Hatta and Cheshire were near. Three small girls sat upon it, smiles on their faces. “We’ll see you soon, your majesty,” the nearest one said. Was that a dismissal? Or a promise? Or perhaps, a warning.


End file.
